Why David Ayer is Making Gotham City Sirens & Not Suicide Squad 2

Suicide Squad director David Ayer explains why he’s making Gotham City Sirens instead of Suicide Squad 2. Last year, the highly-anticipated Suicide Squad movie followed Zack Snyder’s Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice and expanded upon the burgeoning DC Extended Universe, introducing audiences to several of the universe’s maddest villains – including, Will Smith’s Deadshot and Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn, as well as Jared Leto’s Joker. Unfortunately, the movie wasn’t quite what many people were expecting.

The film became the third consecutive DCEU installment (including Snyder’s Man of Steel) to garner mostly negative reviews, though its critical reception did little to dampen its impressive box office run. Suicide Squad grossed over $745 million at the worldwide box office (without releasing in China, the world’s second-largest movie-going market), against an estimated production budget of $175 million. Granted, if the film earned positive reviews, it could have surely done better at the worldwide box office, though there’s no telling how much better. Still, its global take was clearly enough for Warner Bros. to greenlight not only a sequel but a Gotham City Sirens spin-off as well.

Rather than return to helm the upcoming Suicide Squad sequel, it was previously confirmed that Ayer will be directing Gotham City Sirens instead. His decision to vacate the director’s chair for Suicide Squad 2 has been unclear, though he shed some light on that matter in an interview with IGN, while the director was promoting his upcoming Netflix movie, Bright, at San Diego Comic-Con 2017:

“It’s a story about three fantastic women who’re trying to find their way in the world and realize that they have more power together than they do individually. I have daughters, and I want to create something that might be able to help them get along in the world a little bit.”

For those that don’t know, Gotham City Sirens was a short-lived comic book series, created by Batman legend Paul Dini, that focused on three of Gotham’s most notorious female criminals: Catwoman, Harley Quinn, and Poison Ivy. They operated together and kept each other in check during the tumultuous time following Batman’s supposed death, in which Dick Grayson assumed the mantle of the Caped Crusader. So far, the only person confirmed for the film has been Robbie, who will be reprising her role as Harley Quinn. As for the other two villainesses, several actresses have thrown their hats into the ring, though there’s no telling who will land the coveted parts.

Following Suicide Squad‘s release, Ayer has been busy working on Bright, with Smith in the leading role, so it’s unclear if the filmmaker has had ample time to work on Gotham City Sirens‘ script. If he plans on making the flim his next project following Bright‘s release later this year, then it’s possible that one of the recently announced DCEU release dates the studio set for 2020 could be carved out for Gotham City Sirens. Then again, Warners has several DCEU movies in the pipeline, so virtually any one of them could snag up those two dates. Hopefully the studio provides more concrete information during the Hall H panel at SDCC this Saturday.